By Erik Matzen

COPENHAGEN, May 9 (Reuters) - Denmark will hold a referendum on two of its opt-outs from European Union cooperation in September, but will not vote on joining the euro common currency until later, parliamentary sources told Reuters on Friday.

They said Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen has struck a deal with opposition leaders Helle Thorning-Schmidt and Villy Sovndal to put the exemptions from European Union defence and judicial cooperation to a popular vote in September.

"At a number of confidential meetings at the Prime Ministers' Office with pro-EU politicians he has said that it would be best with a referendum on the two opt-o5ts (first)," one source said.

"He doesn't want to take on the euro exemption this time around, because Villy Sovndal is against it," the source added.

Sovndal leads the Socialist People's Party and Thorning-Schmidt the Social Democrats.

Rasmussen announced in November that Danes would vote on whether to end the exemptions during his centre-right government's present four-year mandate.

It was not clear how soon the euro would be put to a referendum.

Rasmussen was in Hungary on Friday and not available to comment on the report but Finance Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, who is not related, told Reuters a referendum would be held "when the population feels comfortable with abolishing the opt-outs".

"We can't hold popular votes all the time," he said.

The Nordic country has had a turbulent relationship with the union since joining its predecessor, the European Economic Community, in 1973.

Danish voters turned down the Maastricht Treaty in 1992 but approved the charter a year later with several exemptions attached. They also rejected the euro in a 2000 vote.

Currently, only two of the eight parties in the Danish parliament, representing about 17 percent of the seats, are opposed to the EU. But EU opposition among grass roots movements is staunch.

While recent polls show that a vote to do away with all of the opt-outs at once would pass by a slim majority, they also show that separate polls to abolish each individual exemption would pass by a more comfortable margin.

The opt-outs mean Denmark can stay outside the development of the bloc in the specific areas of the euro, defence and justice and home affairs policies. The fourth exemption no longer has any practical significance.

Denmark secured the special provisions 15 years ago and is in turn obliged not to obstruct the other member states' cooperation in these areas.

The Danish crown is tied to the common currency in a narrow band around its central parity of 7.46038 per euro <EURDKK=> making the actual process of joining the euro a relatively easy mostly symbolic transition.

Rasmussen, a staunch EU supporter, led his centre-right coalition to a third term in parliamentary elections last year. He has been repeatedly mentioned as one of the favourites to become the first president of the European Union.

(Writing by Kim McLaughlin; Editing by Gerrard Raven)

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